Weaves

This DVD shows the easiest way to train weaves from zero to perfection, giving you total understanding of entries and independence and most efficient footwork, while making it all just another fun game. It also offers plenty of ideas for proofing for dogs who already know how to weave and can improve their weaving style at the same time.

58 Comments

Wow, you are such a natural trainer! You make everything look and sound so easy! How long ( in general) does it take you from wide open to these closed unbelievable weaves? How often would you train them?

As everything, it takes me long as I prefer to not do too many repetitions, so I only train them 1-2 times a week. The most talented dogs with great generalization skills can get there in about 15 sessions and most dogs will need about 30.

Yes, that’s about right as I start early and only close them completely when they’re about 14 months. DW takes me even longer and raising bars to full height as well -- I just like to take my time with everything 🙂 But of curse, if you start with adult dog, then it’s no problem to train it 3 to 4 times a week!

Do you think opening up the poles to a channel will be ok to work entries and challenges for a dog that struggles with collection already? He was trained 2x2 and we struggle with entries/exits as well as collection at the 2nd and 3rd poles. I am concerned it will teach even less collection as he will be able to run faster through the poles. We have been working almost a year on this and still many struggles which is why I am very interested in trying your methods 🙂 We do do a lot of cik/cap.

Yes, I think opening a channel would be good also in his case, just don’t open it so much he can just run through -- so less as body width so he does need to collect SOME -- and then ask for more&more as you close the channel more&more, focusing on challenging entries for him right from the start.

Hi Silvia,
just a little update from our weavechannel work. We’re progressing slowly, because of all the ups and downs in our learning process (Holly has big setbacks from time to time and in all areas -- so I think it’s because of me 😉 )
In that session I wanted to practice rear crosses, because she doesn’t like them (when I come to close to her). But that day it was no problem -- other than sending her. The next session I wanted to do some more sends and less rear crosses and it was the other way around -- the sends were good but the rears not. 🙂

Your dvd is amazing! Thank you so much!! Everything Worked Great so i switched to the normal Slalom. But now my dog is very Slow and doesnt Singlestep anymore. What shoul i do now? Open the Channel or keep going the normal Slalom?

This is my setup. I guess the Problem is, that my weave poles are very thin and edge down a little bit. At home he is very fast, but in Club Training we have Wood poles which are thicker and very solid. Unfortunately i cant mix the Wood poles with my setup.

Could you maybe take your weaves to the club and see if you can replace wooden poles with yours? If diameter is not right, you could also buy some PVC tubes of the correct diameter to replace them. You can next add more&more wooden ones in between. If you can’t make it work, use half of their weaves and half of yours together to help him see it’s the same thing. But yes, wooden poles are not so nice to them, they can hurt and are already forbidden in some countries, so I think we’ll see them less&less…

Oh gosh, I am such a computer dunce, I just bought the weaves DVD download, but don’t know where it is in my iPad? it started playing right away on your site page, but I turned it off and now I have no idea where it is?

Yeah, iPad does not save the file. To do that, you should download the file using the free Downloader + app available in Appstore. Or you can download it to a computer and only then transfer it to your iPad. Let me know if you need another link if the old one is not working anymore.

Have a question for you about what you’d do for a dog like Bu with the perfectionist, sensitive, not so driven, personality…
My girl has beautiful entrances and in training she has very solid exits as well. I can push, pull, fall down (literally), leave laterally, wave toys at her, run the opposite direction, etc and she drive to the end nicely. When training full courses with weaves intermixed she still does great with these different handling scenarios. However when I take her to trials the exits fall apart very quickly and she tends to pop neAr the 10th pole or shortly before if I do anything but remain parallel with the poles, especially if I try to move laterally. She sometimes does better if I keep my arm “lazered” in to support her in the weaves but not always as she still might pop out in anticipation of running the rest of the course.

I thought she just needs experience to learn she must complete her poles even in trial environments so I keep handling like I know she’s able to in training and with her history at trials this is setting her up for a distinct possibility to learn through error and if/when she pops I stop and have her retake the weaves from the start and complete them before we move on. I see this stressing her a bit but so far she’s been able to handle it and is usually able to remain happy to get it correct the next time and eager to continue on with her course, however in the couple of years since we began trialing and since we got your DVD a few months ago to go back over the handling challenges we have made no progress with her being able to complete her poless the first time at trials in scenarios I might handle her in ways other than completely parallel with the poles…

I’m beginning to reconsider my plan of action and maybe quit “setting her up to fail” in scenarios i know she has difficulty with in trials (since im not seeing any change in results from allowing these learning opportunities to happen again and again) but maybe rather just tailor to our strengths and give the support needed in areas of our weakness? Meaning I’m beginning to think I should just quit trying to handle her weaves in such ways t trials that I KNOW she is fully caple of doing in training and might just need to support her more through “babysitting” through the the completion of all her poles and only then handle what comes next at trials? It might put me behind fora little while on course but it would keep her successful and the trial and error route hasn’t seemed to give us success but rather only build stress if she encounters those scenarios too often and is made to retry to get them correct the second times.

I know this has been a long message and I apologize. But i would love to know what would you personally do with Bu if you were in this scenario where they keep nailing things in training so simply making things more and more difficult seems to make no difference when you take these same things to trials and keep faulting them, with no apparent signs of improvement? I figure you probably have such a trained eye that you’re rarely, if ever, in this kind of situation but figured it’s worth asking!

I always try to dose difficulties so they’re successful in about 80% in training (that is on a 1st try) and even more in trials, so yes, I would help her more. By letting her fail too often, I think you’re just practising a pattern of popping out and then trying again in trials. So help her succeed more -- and then praise it a lot so she sees it’s what you want -- and then add difficulties in trials more gradually. I always strain way harder things as I expect them to do in trials, knowing I’m a bit different, the obstacles are different etc.

Also just to clarify, im not worried about qualifying although it woul be nice. Im interested in *improving*. Im just not sure which might be the better gameplan to go with- continuing to challenge her at trials (which has shown no history of improvement as of yet) OR setting her up for a strong history of success at trials (but with relatively little challenge being asked of her to improve upon)…

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Silvia Trkman is known for bringing every dog, from her first dog on, to the very top of the sport. Her dogs are known for great speed, tight turns, running contacts and long and injury-free careers. Silvia is in agility since 1992 and is

– 3x World Champion (with two different dogs)

– 5x European Open winner, with 4 different dogs (Lo, La, Bu, Le)!!!
– National Championships podium and World Team member with every dog she’s ever had
– National Champion for 22-times (with 5 different dogs of 3 different breeds)

– World Team member for 19-times (mostly with at least two dogs at the time – sometimes four 🙂 )